If you make it so only rich people can do a certain thing, you'll have way fewer people doing that thing. I'm curious what kind of inconveniences this has caused for people who can't afford to pay the fee though.
I ask because the "only rich people" criticism of NYCs project has been beaten into the dirt and discussed at nearly every level of politics for more than a year now. If there's anything you want to know the information is readily available.
I don't believe that for a second. They could afford to drive a car, insure it, maintain it, buy fuel, and pay for very expensive parking in NYC, but $9 is too much now?
I'd be more than happy to be proven wrong if there's any data that suggest that this is actually true.
This kind of argument reminds me of a French politician who defended a tax on sweet drinks as a way to fight against the obesity crisis looming (France performs better than most country in that regard, but the situation is still bad). She wanted a tax to deter the consumption of sweet drinks, but at the same time they wanted the tax to stay at “a level where it would not affect the purchasing power of people”.
Funny because I was going to use that exact example as something that absolutely works. I can easily afford the sugar tax where I live, it's been around for a few years now. But when I go to a store and a box of regular coke is more expensive than diet it makes me not pick regular even though the difference is meaningless financially to me.
I understand the same mechanism works with cigarettes and loads of other things - even if you can afford them the increasing price puts you off.
But maybe for a more relevant example - I can comfortably afford parking right in the city centre where I live. But the idea of paying what's being asked for parking puts me off so much I just park at the nearest park and ride and take the metro in.
Using market-style policies to try to nudge people around only works if there are alternatives they can choose from. In this case for many people there are not.
And like I said in my other comment - those people most likely still continue driving and pay the $9 fee. It's people who have other options or who simply don't really need to be there who have now stopped.
This exact same scheme has played out in many other cities already, this isn't new.
None of the blue collar workers in Manhattan (the janitors, the restaurant waiters and cook, etc. the massive working class that is needed for white collar work to be able to operate) can live in Manhattan.
So you're telling me that the very same people who refuse to buy non-brand Coke copies whose taste is indistinguishable from true Coke in blind tests would accept to buy Diet Coke despite it tasting like shit in a way that everyone can feel? And they would do so for a smaller gain than what it would save them to buy the cheap copy?
You're trying to make it seem like driving in NYC is simply a lifestyle decision that people could choose to do or not do. For some people it is, for many people it's simply the only viable option. Once you make it no longer viable, people have no options left.
Which implies that the people who continue driving are indeed those who have no other option, and those who do have taken it instead of paying the $9. Would you disagree?
And no, of course I don't imply it's a lifestyle choice - merely that some people(not all!) were driving in NYC even though they indeed had other options available, because there was no extra cost associated with it - now that there is, those people use those other options where possible.
Again, it's really fun to speculate why who and where is doing what, but if you have more specific data then please share.
-- Fry (Futurama)
I know that legitimizes a bunch of activist talking points but come on.
This is HN
> Commutes on Hudson River and East River crossings for several express bus routes linking the boroughs with Manhattan have, on some lines, shaved more than 15 minutes off commuting times.
That’s a rather dramatic improvement.
Literally no one has stepped forward and said “I can’t afford $9 or $2.95 or the deep discount commuter tickets.”
The poor car owner who can't afford $9 stories are all made up nonsense. "Not everyone has $9 to spend to drive their tens of thousands of dollars car."
It's almost never needed to faregate sidewalks. Tourist districts can organize a special improvement district tax on stores to fund sidewalk upgrades, trash collection, shuttles, security, parking, and planting flowers. This makes the zone more even more attractive to tourists.
Auctioning off to the highest bidder the right to move around is cruel because you make it so that some people simply can't afford to exist in public spaces, and because you're telling people that their own city or neighborhood doesn't even belong to them.
The correct analogy here would be access to healthcare, water, or electricity.
Keep in mind that we're not talking about some suburb where you have to drive two miles to get to the store, but rather about the most walkable place of its size in the US.
Look at a school. Many make the front driveway bus only. Because parents dropping off kids one at a time was very low capacity and causing a line of cars to form every morning backing up into the road. There's just not enough space for everyone to drive single occupancy cars to the same destination within the same half hour time slot. Favoring school buses in the school driveway is not an attack on drivers. It's acknowledging the limits of geometry and time, and choosing to get the most out of our common space.
Providing additional impetus to make a change seems virtuous.
But it's not because “doing nothing” is bad that any decision is good.
This kind of decisions that reduces the freedom of movement of the majority but spare the rich is exactly how people like Trump reach power.
You want to solve the urban planning problem that is car congestion, then the solution is a urban planning one, not a new tax.
Or at least if you want to leverage economic incentives, you have to give everyone working in Manhattan and not living there $200 a month so that their overall purchasing power isn't impacted (the marginal price of taking the car stays the same, and so does the incentive).
Trump got power because we are a garbage people with neither merit nor intelligence.
It is making people who weren't willingly using public transit use it, so surely it is affecting their freedom somehow.
> Trump got power because we are a garbage people with neither merit nor intelligence.
I don't think this kind of essentialism helps in any way.